The Curse of Claire Matthews
by n.jones
Summary: Yes, it was evident, that Claire Matthews was made for worship, for being adored reverently from afar, for being put on the pedestal of martyrs or saints or muses. Too bad Claire Matthews wanted none of it.


**Hey there, dear Readers, thank you for giving this a chance. I was very much taken by the chemistry between Claire and Ryan in the first season and sometimes I thought the audience and the critics were oh so mean to Claire. I'm trying to do her character justice, let's see how it goes**

The Curse of Claire Matthews

It was very easy to idolize Claire Matthews. Her slender, fragile figure, her classically beautiful face framed by blonde curls, her expressive blue eyes were those of a leading heroine in a romance. She was a selfless person, an intellectual and she had a kind of endearing, self-deprecating humor. An air of sadness surrounded her, even (or especially) when she smiled, which only made her more compelling, more mysterious – a development, no doubt, of the last couple of years.

Yes, it was evident, that Claire Matthews was made for worship, for being adored reverently from afar, for being put on the pedestal of martyrs or saints or muses.

She inspired the obsession of serial killer Joe Carroll.

She brought out an angst-filled protectiveness in Ryan Hardy.

She became the unattainable object of desire for her Follower, Charlie.

Too bad Claire Matthews wanted none of it.

She had almost instantly known what she wanted, when she grew closer to Ryan Hardy – the FBI agent with the bad flirting material. After all the terrible things had come to light, after he managed to capture Joe, amidst those hellish months of the trial, when she sat in the foyer of the court house day in day out with her head in her hands, not bearing to hear any more brutal details about that monster she called her husband… about the father of her baby, for heaven's sake!... cursing her stupidity, her blindness, wallowing in remorse…

At that exact moment when agent Hardy came up to her with his usual swagger and handed her a cup of awful tea from the buffet, offered a crooked smile and an 'are you alright?' and she looked up at him, looked straight into his tortured, knowing blue eyes and she saw understanding, she finally felt that she had a friend, perhaps her only friend now. With the realization came a desperate need to _connect_ with him, to learn more _about_ him, a certain curiosity she _had_ to act upon… she gratefully took the tea and patted the spot on the bench beside her. He sat, they started talking, she touched his arm, he never pulled away.

And before she knew it, there it was.

She was in love with him.

And they were happy for a while, so carefree, so rapturous. She enjoyed their easy banter and the way he caressed her neck in the mornings after hours of strenuous love making, she loved the candle-lit dinners at Jenny's restaurant and in fact grew very fond of his sister. She cherished the moments when Ryan was around baby Joey, treating him like he was his own. Above all, she wanted to make him see, to make him understand that he was not alone in this world, that she was never going to leave him, that his curse theory is a non-sense…

But apparently there was no convincing Ryan. After he gave that brief account of his tragic family history, something changed.

She watched helplessly as he grew more and more distant, cringed at his cryptic utterances about her needing to move on, clean slate and all, without any sorry reminders. Then one evening he told her curtly that he was finished here, discharged from the Bureau, moving back to Brooklyn. He said he never deserved her and though she wanted to yell at him for coming up with such a weak excuse for leaving her, she couldn't blame him for not wanting to deal with the ex-wife and the son of the mass-murderer who gave him a pacemaker. This whole mess with Joe had cost him his health and now his career and it was every bit as her fault as it was Joe's. So she bit back her tears and kissed him, made him promise he'd call. He nodded, gave her a fierce hug but refused to look her in the eye – Claire wasn't surprised that he never got around.

Now, nine years later, her killer ex-husband was at large, her house was a-buzz and surrounded by the police, the FBI called in to investigate and she was standing in her bedroom, clutching Joe's accusatory letter but somehow she refused to panic.

 _Ryan._


End file.
